What if the good life is not the most comfortable ride, but the most meaningful one?
In this presentation we explored three ways of moving through the world.
The car life keeps the windows up. It is private, insulated, comfortable. We focus on our own lane, our own schedule, our own bubble.
The bus life brings us alongside others, provided we find the courage to engage. And we benefit from community.
The bike life is different again. There are greater risks. We are exposed. Wind in our faces. Progress takes effort, but with every effort a reward. We are immersed in nature and neighbourhood and cannot avoid the reality of the terrain. We are part of it.
Accidental defaults
Many of us live like drivers without ever choosing to. We are driven by instincts towards greater comfort and security. Yet if everyone lived the average Australian lifestyle, we would need five planets. Our consumption patterns drive biodiversity loss and climate disruption. We are, whether we like it or not, among the wealthy few globally.
The hard question is not who is to blame for the current and impending state of affairs. It is now how willing we are to accept accountability and take action.
In the presentation I shared stories of how my perspective has shifted. It was not linear. There was volunteering in Vietnam. Lessons in Laos. Moments of mountaintop meltdown and clarity through crisis. We got caught in the “car,” windows wound up tight. And only after reaching the bottom began the process of reconnection on the “bus” and the “bike.”
The lesson, so slow to learn was that contentment equals haves divided by wants.
When we get lower the bar on wants, freedoms of every nature expand.
The bike life is not about perfection, in fact it is anything but. It is about choosing practicality over purity. About living more and consuming less. It is about connection, courage, and becoming a taller poppy so others feel safer to rise too.
Research into wellbeing points to six core ingredients: positive emotion, engagement, relationships, meaning, achievement, and health. The bike life nurtures all six. It often comes with less stress and fewer emissions and lower costs. This gives us the capacity to give more money, more time, and with some limitations, more blood.
It does not cost as much as we think to save a human life through highly effective charities such as The Life You Can Save. Small shifts, multiplied across thousands of Australians, would change the moral landscape of our nation.
It takes inspiration
This page is your space. Help others rise too. Whether it is literally jumping on your bike or committing a share of your income or wealth to effective charity, sharing is caring as it inspires others.
- What have you done for the greater good?
- What changes do you hope to make?
Share your commitment in the comments below. Be a taller poppy. Someone else may need to see it to find the courage to leave the car and start pedalling.
Transcript
Below is a portion of the transcript. I have not prepared the full transcript as I am on free plans for the tools that might do this automatically and have prioritised other things than typing it manually. For the full content, please watch the video.
Three Things to Take Away Today
Alright, so there’s three things that I’m here for today, and they’re all about you.
We as individuals really can have a potentially very significant impact, for better or for worse. That’s number one, and I have stories associated with each of these things from my own personal experience.
The second is that we are actually really fortunate. Everyone in this room is among the luckiest people in the world, even if we feel like at times life is pretty challenging or miserable in particular ways, or the future is really uncertain.
The third is that a life that is complete with challenge, that has discomfort in it, is actually a really colourful, worthwhile life. It’s not necessarily even harder, once you get into it, than a life full of convenience and comfort that we otherwise feel compelled to move towards.
Those are the three points.
Gratitude for the Guardians
I’m going to start by acknowledging the country that we’re on and the gratitude that we owe to the guardians of this land, Meanjin, the place of the water lilies. For thousands of years, tens of thousands of years, they established what was basically a steady-state environmental situation here. A steady-state economy and a steady-state existence. There was great wisdom in that that we completely overlooked.
I would also like to acknowledge that we’re not just lucky, but that we are prosperous because of the way that we exploited not just people, but resources. And we continue to do that now. I can give money away. It’s not really my money to give. It comes because of a process of exploitation that started thousands of years ago and culminated in the career that I’m working in now.
I hope that in the future we can regain some of the wisdom that Indigenous people worldwide have taken from nature, from knowing their place in the world and living as part of the world rather than oppressing it and taking from it.
Inhibitions to Involvement
In 2006, Emelie and I went to Vietnam to volunteer.
I was on a shuttle bus on my way from one volunteer location to the next, seated at the front. It felt like we were on a river of humanity, all these mopeds zipping around, with a few buses and trucks spread amongst them.
Looking at the windscreen in front of me, I saw a motorbike ahead of us with a pillion rider on it. It started to wobble. My heart rate rose. I knew I should be doing something about this, but what could I do? I’m just a passenger on a bus in a foreign country, and the driver is Vietnamese.
I wanted to do something. I felt like I probably should do something. But I didn’t.
The bike fell over while I watched. It looked like slow motion. We say that because the adrenaline was probably already up. I saw that something might have been going to happen. The passenger smacked their head very hard on the road. They were wearing a full-face helmet.
I wanted the driver to stop. We were closing distance on them. At the very least, we could have sheltered these bikes from all the traffic that was moving around them.
But we didn’t stop.
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Watch the video for the full story.
Connecting with Community
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We share resources. If you’ve got one successful orange tree, you might grow 300 kilograms of oranges a year. What are you going to do with that? Real resilience and real connection come from having this as a community. You’ve got oranges, I’ll plant mandarins. You’ve got limes, I’ll plant avocados. Let’s swap when the seasons come around. Let’s have a festival.
It works. I exchanged five limes for about 200 oranges because the exchange rate for limes is excellent. The kids prefer mandarins, so I took the oranges to work. Someone there had a mandarin tree, but the crows were eating them. He took a couple of oranges and I ended up with another hundred mandarins. Five limes became more fruit than I could possibly eat, so I gave most of it away. Two or three oranges to each of the hundred-plus people in my office. They were delighted. It cost me nothing.
Further afield, engaging online through Facebook and Reddit means an abundance of knowledge is exchanged. We’ve connected with people who’ve moved away or who we’ve met on our journey. Wherever we go, we often have free accommodation. We can holiday effectively for nothing.
We call this the “bike life.” It’s engaged with nature. It’s not necessarily comfortable or convenient, but it aligns very well with wellbeing.
Benefits of the “bike” life
These are inherent benefits of this lifestyle.
Positive emotions. Finding and making time for wonder and gratitude. Engaging in the moment. Being present. Giving attention to people and things that actually matter.
Relationships. Not just romantic relationships, but relationships with ourselves, with nature, with the world around us, and with other people.
Meaning. Engaging in something bigger than ourselves. Putting the windows down or getting back on the bike. We’re no longer concerned about the temperature of the air conditioning. There are bigger things to be concerned about.
Achievement. Learning things each day. Small achievements.
Health. By being on the bike physically and doing these activities, we spend more time in nature, more time outside, more exercise, more sunlight. Less stress. Better food.
Giving More Money
We gave about $50,000 to effective charities last year, about a quarter of our income.
The number I wanted you to remember is this: the cost to save one human life using the most effective interventions is about $5,000. That could be vitamin supplementation, mosquito nets, malaria prevention. These are low-hanging fruit that are under-recognised by major health bodies.
In Australia, preventing one death might cost closer to $10 million because we’ve already addressed the low-hanging fruit. Now we’re funding cancer research or improving automotive safety. All necessary, but expensive.
If we recognise that all human lives have equal value, and we focus on the most effective charities, we can do many times more good.
Giving More Blood
I gave blood three times. Emelie couldn’t because her iron was low, but she organised at least five other donations through her school.
About 3% of the population are regular blood donors, yet roughly a third of us will need blood at some point. We’re very lucky for those donors. It costs us nothing. They give you free cookies.
Giving More Time
Time is our most precious commodity. Attention needs to be given to causes we care about instead of to tech platforms competing for it.
I spent time at the Repair Café. I did tree planting to improve water quality for our local platypus population. I collected litter. Going slower gives you the opportunity to bend down and pick something up. You can’t do that flying past in a car.
I worked at the food bank, distributing goods from a limited-hours bank to one open 24 hours. I participated in interest groups and community discussions that felt worthwhile.
We met new neighbours. That was scary. Two adults knocking on doors makes people think you’re selling something. But people were delighted.
One woman had been grieving a stillborn child and had lived there for a year without knowing anyone. She was close to collapse. Now she’s thriving and has a child. We’ve become close friends.
Single men along our strip hadn’t spoken to each other. We hosted a dinner. They discovered shared histories and interests. They’re still in touch.
We gave attention where it was deserved, and many aspects of being close to death in our lives and others’ lives were eliminated.
It took courage. It was awkward. But discomfort is what makes us alive.
… with Less Stress
We had less stress because we had clearer boundaries. When work asked for unreasonable things, I said no. With friends, I said I’m full at the moment.
Confidence rose as we became more vulnerable. Vulnerability disarms. It builds authenticity.
Our relationship changed. I’ve never loved Emelie more than I do now that she spends weeks away sometimes. Previously I would have been insecure. Now I’m delighted she’s having a good time.
We realised we were financially abundant enough to effectively retire at 41 if we chose to live differently. So we’re trying.
… with Less Emmissions and Earths
The average Australian emits around 21 tonnes of carbon annually. Ours is about 2.3 tonnes. The fair global share for a 50% chance of staying under 1.5 degrees is about 2 tonnes per person.
The Australian lifestyle is roughly ten times our fair share.
Across all resources, not just carbon, if everyone lived the Australian lifestyle, we would need five Earths.
Currently we use about 45% of Earth’s ice-free land for agriculture. Even if we used all of it, we could not fit the Australian lifestyle onto one planet.
Something has to change.
Starting the Shrink
There may be inspiration here. There may be guilt. All feelings have a role.
We need to grieve what we won’t have in order to move forward.
Be a little messy. Move on from perfection. Lower the bar so others can start.
Immerse yourself in experiences you’ve taken for granted. Take two minutes to eat a strawberry with full attention. Leave the air conditioning off on a hot day and feel what it is to be alive.
Swap beef for beans. It’s the most practical single exchange with the greatest planetary impact at the lowest personal cost.
Try a week without a TV, subscription services, a car, or animal products. A week makes it manageable. In that week, you discover things that make permanent change easier.
Be firm with boundaries. If you can work less, that’s probably a net positive. We are conditioned to work as if we’re still in a European winter, but abundance surrounds us.
Sharing is caring
When we share, things grow.
If you have spare rooms, consider long-term accommodation. Immigration is one of the most effective ways to improve global equality because migrants send money home.
If you have underutilised property, consider reducing pressure on the housing market.
Share tools, toys, camping gear.
Give attention to people you love instead of to screens.
Give love. Smile at the checkout operator. Build a relationship.
Give blood if you can. Emelie is alive because people did.
If you have money you don’t need, consider directing it to effective causes where it makes the difference between life and death.
The Invitation
I gave each group a red book. Inside are four bookmarks and four $50 notes. That money came from my account, but it’s not really mine. I exploited opportunities available to me. I won at capitalism.
Help me return that money to where it belongs.
If you need it, keep it and pay it forward later. But I’d love you to start something now. Values only become real when turned into action.
The QR code links to The Life You Can Save. Consider a monthly or annual donation so it becomes normal and no longer feels like a sacrifice.
If you value all lives equally, Animal Charity Evaluators shows you can help hundreds or thousands of animals for the same cost as saving one human life because there’s even more low-hanging fruit there.
If you’re fit and well, book in to give blood.
And if you want to share what you’re doing, the QR code links to the event page. Sign in. Comment on what you got from today. Tell us what you’re doing for the greater good.
We want a community. There are people here who care. You have the opportunity to build that and make more friends with one another.
Downloads
Download a copy of the slides and notes below, including a few extra slides that did not make the final cut:
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